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Sunday, August 31, 2014

I am going to be changing the 'Chicken Lady's Picks of FREE eBooks' to only posting a few days each week instead of every day. This way I won't drive my email subscribers crazy with so many emails. So after today, I will be making this post only on Tuesdays & Saturdays from here on out. And remember, Please leave me a comment if you like this series of posts as it will encourage me to continue bringing you a new list of FREE eBooks!

I will be making some changes to the type of books I include as well. I will still be posting books that I am personally purchasing, in my favorite genre's like non-ficition, books based on a true story, or fiction that seems non-fiction, self-help, autobiographies, true-crime, cook books sometimes, and children's books. But now I will also include a few that are not necessarily my kind of books, like sci-fi, romance novels, books about sports, as long as they have very high reviews on Amazon.

You don't have to have an Amazon Kindle to Read Kindle eBooks.

So here we go with the 'Chicken Lady's Picks of FREE eBooks'

[*BEFORE PURCHASING* Please look at the price of the book before you purchase it. These books were listed as $0.00 at the time of this post, but as I mentioned earlier, this is usually a short term promotion and then they go back to the full price.]

From the AuthorThis book is for you if:

You're sick and tired of worrying about money

You're sick and tired of having the lack of money control your emotions

If you're depressed, drained or anxious about your financial situation

If you're ready to stop wasting money and want to see a fat bank balance instead

If you're ready to start accumulating and creating REAL wealth

If you're ready to create the life, money and relationships that will make you feel rich

If you want to find out the real reasons and trigger points that cause you use money in ways that sabotage your success

If you want to become a magnate for all things positive

If you want to be a better partner, parent or friend

How we roll in one area is pretty much how we roll in general. Cleaning up your financial act can be the magic beans you need.

~~~~~~~

ALEX LUTHECKER lives off of the grid. He prefers the comfort of the
night. He avoids the crowded and chaotic daylight hours, because the
relentless anxieties of the multitudes overwhelm him. This is because
Alex has a rare gift. He is a pattern reader. Patterns in nature,
patterns in social groups, patterns in individual behavior, he can
recognize them all. With one conversation, he knows all of your secrets.
He can tell you exactly who you are. He can tell you exactly how your
life is going to end. For Alex, it’s not magic. It’s math.

NICOLE ELLIS works in the energy business. She trades futures in the
lifeblood of civilization: crude oil. With the help of her patented
pattern recognition software, PHOEBE, she has the uncanny ability to
predict trends in oil production and consumption. And at the tender age
of twenty-five, she is recognized as one of the best in the business,
with the bank account to show for it. For Nicole, who grew up with
nothing, the world is hers.

RICHARD BROWN was a highly respected intelligence officer during
both Gulf Wars. He oversaw rendition squads, making sure that his
interrogators didn’t cross the line into torture, and if they did, that
no one would ever be the wiser. The only thing that mattered to the
government was that Brown always got his man. His track record of
success allowed his move into the private sector, eventually heading the
corporate entity known as Coalition Properties, the largest military
contractor in U.S. history. For Brown, the commodity he trades and
sells is power.

A terrorist attack on a Saudi oil refinery sets the paths of all
three on a collision course, an encounter that threatens to upset the
balance of power in the world. Alex must learn to forge relationships
and become a leader in order to save the lives of not only himself and
Nicole, but also those of his loose band of allies, as he becomes one of
the most sought after fugitives in history.

~~~~~~~

Pinkerton doesn't understand his owner’s commands. When told to come, he
jumps out the window. When asked to fetch, he destroys the slippers
instead. Pinkerton’s desperate owners take him to obedience school, but
he flunks out in record time. Then one night a burglar breaks into their
house, and Pinkerton is able to put his bad habits to good use.

This silly charmer of a story was included on the Booklist and Horn Book
best of the year lists and inspired four sequels about the impossibly
clueless but irresistibly sweet Pinkerton. Now, in honor of its 35th
anniversary, Steven Kellogg has updated the art and text (most notably
removing the gun that appeared in the original edition), and has written
an introductory note about the book’s history.
Available September 4, 2014.

~~~~~~~

At a critical juncture during brain surgery, Alex Dixon, age 12, had a stroke. . .

Alex was a normal, bright, and healthy little girl, when the sudden
onset of a mysterious illness began to take over her life. Months of
physical therapy and medication failed to provide relief from acute pain
and muscle spasms. Doctors across the country were at a loss for
answers. A last-ditch attempt at treatment—brain surgery—ended up
stopping the spasms but with unexpected, dire consequences.

A Stroke of Luck is the remarkable true story of a close-knit family
that meets challenge after challenge with resilience, hope, and love.

**
This book is also available for Free with your KindleUnlimited subscription.
Learn more

NOTE ABOUT KINDLES & AMAZON: Buy the way, you do not need a Kindle device to read Kindle books, you can download the Kindle app to your Laptop, Desktop, Smartphone, iPad and just about any smart devices. You will need an Amazon account to purchase the free books. Sign-up is super easy if you don't already have one. To get a Free book you have to go through the purchase process even though the price is $0.00. You will need a method of payment on file with Amazon, but they will not charge your card to 'purchase' a free ebook.

*This was an unpaid, unsolicited post about the products shown above that I have purchased myself. Neither the authors nor the publishers have asked me to include their books in this post. I have included Affiliate links in this post, please see my Full Disclosure here.

Saturday, August 30, 2014

Here are today's 'Chicken Lady's Picks of FREE eBooks. I hope you find something you like! Please leave me a comment if you like this series of posts as it will encourage me to continue bringing you a new list of FREE eBooks daily!

I will only be posting books that I am personally purchasing, so you wont find any sci-fi, romance novels, or sports books here, sorry if those are your favorite genre's. I like non-ficition, books based on a true story, or fiction that seems non-fiction, self-help, autobiographies, true-crime, cook books sometimes, and children's books.

So here we go..."Chicken Lady's Picks: FREE eBook Daily"

[*BEFORE PURCHASING* Please look at the price of the book before you purchase it. These books were listed as $0.00 at the time of this post, but as I mentioned earlier, this is usually a short term promotion and then they go back to the full price.]

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I have not read any of these books yet, just decided to purchase them for FREE today because they sounded interesting to me. I hope you find something you like.

NOTE ABOUT KINDLES & AMAZON: Buy the way, you do not need a Kindle device to read Kindle books, you can download the Kindle app to your Laptop, Desktop, Smartphone, iPad and just about any smart devices. You will need an Amazon account to purchase the free books. Sign-up is super easy if you don't already have one. To get a Free book you have to go through the purchase process even though the price is $0.00. You will need a method of payment on file with Amazon, but they will not charge your card to 'purchase' a free ebook.

*This was an unpaid, unsolicited post about the products shown above that I have purchased myself. Neither the authors nor the publishers have asked me to include their books in this post. I have included Affiliate links in this post, please see my Full Disclosure here.

Friday, August 29, 2014

I love reading. I love books. I love eBooks especially. And I may need a 12-step program in the near future for my Kindle eBook addiction. I'm not ready to 'admit I have a problem' yet. But I think I might be getting close because just this morning I topped 900 books on my Kindle!

I have about 5 to 10 books going at any one time. They are usually on totally unrelated topics so it's easy to not get them confused. The beauty of having all my books on Kindle (on my iPad) is that I can read whatever book I am in the mood for, at any given moment. I carry my iPad with me everywhere so I will always have a great book to read no matter where I am, or how much time I have to spare. I read on the patio while the dogs are outside doing their morning routine, while I am waiting at my dr's office, or getting a car repair done, or waiting in the car while Terry is yabber gapping with the guys at the welding shop, while having lunch or just a coffee by myself, while going to the bathroom (the kindle is way more interesting then those old magazines in there) or when I am the passenger on a long drive. There are always opportunities to read, and with Kindle on my iPad, I am never without just the right book to read.

I just can't stop myself from buying new books that sound interesting to me or children's books that I purchase for when the grandkids are with me. You might think that I would be dead broke from buying over 900 eBooks, but I really have not spent more than maybe $35 total on all these books. How you ask? Well I am a bit of a Free-Book hunter & gatherer. Often times when a book is new on the market, or an author is trying to get lots of great reviews to help sell their books, they will offer them for FREE for a very short period of time. Then they go right back up to the full price. So if you act quickly you can pick up some fabulous books for FREE!

I am going to try a new regular post here, featuring my picks to share my finds with you. If it gets a good response I will continue, so if you like this series of posts, please leave a comment to let me know...this will encourage me to continue bringing you posts with more and more Free eBooks.

I will only be posting books that I am personally purchasing, so you wont find any sci-fi, romance novels, or sports books here, sorry if those are your favorite genre's. I like non-ficition, books based on a true story, or fiction that seems non-fiction, self-help, autobiographies, true-crime, cook books sometimes, and children's books.

So here we go, my first official "Chicken Lady's Picks: FREE eBook Daily"

[*BEFORE PURCHASING* Please look at the price of the book before you purchase it. These books were listed as $0.00 at the time of this post, but as I mentioned earlier, this is usually a short term promotion and then they go back to the full price.]

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~~~~~~

~~~~~~~

I have not read any of these books yet, just decided to purchase them for FREE today because they sounded interesting to me. I hope you find something you like.

NOTE ABOUT KINDLES & AMAZON: Buy the way, you do not need a Kindle device to read Kindle books, you can download the Kindle app to your Laptop, Desktop, Smartphone, iPad and just about any smart devices. You will need an Amazon account to purchase the free books. Sign-up is super easy if you don't already have one. To get a Free book you have to go through the purchase process even though the price is $0.00. You will need a method of payment on file with Amazon, but they will not charge your card to 'purchase' a free ebook.

*This was an unpaid, unsolicited post about the products shown above that I have purchased myself. Neither the authors nor the publishers have asked me to include their books in this post. I have included Affiliate links in this post, please see my Full Disclosure here.

If you have a blog then you know the quandary about whether or not to use the Captcha, or require approving every single comment before it goes live, or requiring every commenter to be signed in to certain networks to leave a comment. It is not an each decision. You want to let everyone who reads your blog, to be able to share their thoughts without a hassle. If your readers have to jump through a bunch of hoops, they may in the end, decide it's just not worth it and keep their thoughts to themselves. And that is not what blogging is about. I want to hear your thoughts, even when they are in opposition to my own.

Personally I H-A-T-E when I am trying to leave a comment on someones blog and have to enter the Captcha phrase. If I'm using my phone, it is so small that I can't hardly see it to begin with, and then my auto-text tries to 'fix' the jumble of letters in a captcha for me. It never fails that I will get one with the letter 'L' but its in the lower case so I wonder is that and 'l' or and 'I'? I almost always get it wrong. And then sometimes that causes my comment to disappear so if I didn't have the forethought of copying it before entering the captcha then its gone. Grrrr!

So on this blog I don't use the Captcha, but I do require that I approve each and every comment before it goes live. I do this, which is a total pain in my rear, because it stops the spammers. Those spammers are awful. I get at least a few a day! Their goal is to make a nonsensical statement in hopes that it appears like they have really read the post (so they don't look like spammers), then they include a link to something they are selling or maybe even a link to a page where the unsuspecting clicker will pick up a nasty computer virus.

Image by Vlado at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

It is obvious they haven't read the post. Most of them look like they were really trying to appear like they did read it. Many others look like they used Google Translate to put their statement into English, but it ends up about as clear as the instruction manuals that come with the stuff my husband buys at Harbor Freight (where nothing in the store came from within the US borders).

Here are a few examples that I received just yesterday -for your entertainment. Notice the title of my post they are commenting on, and how their comment doesn't even come close to matching the post. (NOTE: I have altered their links so they are not click-able and would take you nowhere, but wanted to show them. Also, I have NOT edited their comments at all...this is exactly how they came.).

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I can't believe that any of these tactics have ever worked for the spammers...but it must or they would stop doing it, right? So now you see why pre-approving every comment is necessary. These are all anonymous, but I even get these using fictitious accounts as well. I want you to be able to share your thoughts without the need to be signed in to this or that. I don't even mind if you want to remain anonymous, as long as your comment is a true comment related to the subject at hand, and doesn't include a link to something other than your REAL Blog or Website (that isn't selling something).

This is a place to come and share with me and my other readers, not a place to pedal your wares, or try to infect my readers with virus's. So please understand that the fact that your comment has to be moderated before it goes live is not a reflection on you, it's to protect you and my other readers.

Wednesday, August 27, 2014

The walls in our home are like huge white canvas's waiting for us to be inspired and put something on them. We have been here two and one-half years and I have only painted one wall in the living room (a pretty sage green), and the lower half of one wall in the kitchen, it's painted sort of a textured barn red. I haven't painted any other walls and I haven't hung any pictures (other then in my kitchen), because I didn't want to throw just something on the wall. To me that would be as empty as hanging one of those picture frames that comes from the store with a stock image of some family already in it. I want my walls to express who I am. I want something kind of funky-creative, because that is who I am in my core.

My daughter gave me the painting below for my last birthday...I call it my Chicken Picasso. She found it at a thrift store and called me before buying it because she wanted to ask if it would offend me if she bought me a gift from a thrift store. I'm sure she knew it wouldn't, but she asked anyway (sweet girl). She said she saw this painting and immediately thought of me, and since my birthday was coming up...

I love it! Not just like it...I LOVE It! Interestingly the background color in the painting is identical to the color I painted under the chair-rail. She hadn't seen my wall paint yet, so this was just meant to be I think.

The other day while my husband was out of town working, I was having lunch by myself at the Wildflower Bread Company. If you are from Arizona, then you probably are familiar with this place. They bake fresh Artisan breads everyday so the place always smell so yummy. They make delicious sandwiches, pasta and soups and serve them with a huge hung of fresh bread, or in a bread bowl...mmm!(Ok stop thinking about that bread!) So anyhoo, while I am sitting there eating my lunch, I am admiring the pretty flower prints sprinkled throughout the restaurant on their walls, their menu boards and on the table tents. I suddenly feel a spark of creativity.

Being a child of the 60's these pretty flowers just resonate with me. They remind me of the fun times growing up in the 'Peace, Love & Hippies' era. I like that feeling, and I get the idea to put some of them on the wall behind our bed. We don't have a headboard (and don't want one), so this would be perfect! On my way home I stopped by Home Depot and picked up a few sample paints in pretty colors that appealed to me, and a few sponge brushes. That evening I painted the wall...then I started thinking, "gee, I hope Terry likes them." He is a child of the 60's as well so I figured he probably would. If not, then we could just paint over them with that boring white canvas looking paint. What do you think?

This picture was taken before I finished my second coat on the pink flower on the left.

They are really big, (for perspective our bed is a king size and the purple flower is just over 2 feet wide), but quite simple. And I love them. It makes me feel calm and brings a smile to my face every time I walk into our room, or when I crawl into bed.

When Terry came home a few days later, I was away from home at my dog training classes, so he happened upon them when he was putting his luggage away. I didn't tell him before he got home what I did, I wanted it to be a surprise. I do things like this when he is away. I don't know if he fears what I will do when he is away, or if he likes the surprises he gets when he comes home. This one he loved!

Monday, August 25, 2014

I went to the dermatologist today to have him/her look at the brown spots on my hands and arms. They started developing about six years ago and recently have been doing some weird changing, so I wanted to get it checked out. I haven't been to a dermatologist before, therefore I have nothing to compare it to, so perhaps my visit was quite normal. But to me, it was the strangest experience I've ever had in a doctors office. Let me tell you about it...

My doctor turned out to be a female doctor, I wasn't sure because they were squeezing me in to see who ever was available. It begins quite normally with a short Q & A with the assistant, then she has me change into a gown that is open in the back, and she tells me the doc will be with me momentarily. The doctor walks in the room a few moments later with a headband style magnifier on her head, which makes her look like she has giant eyeballs.

She looked like this mannequin, but her eyes were even more magnified. (And of course she had hair.)

So she walks right up to me, well inside my personal bubble, and introduces herself to me, speaking so fast I almost couldn't understand her. She asks me what brought me in today...that part I understood. She is so close to me and those giant eyeballs are darting around looking at every centimeter of my face.
It was a little disconcerting. I moved my head backwards in a
subconscious reaction that just happens without thinking, because your
brain sends the signal that someone or something is invading your
personal space.

I begin to explain that I have these brown spots that I guess are normal
for folks my age, and I tell her that mine seem to be changing so it
concerned me. I point out a few in different stages on my arms and the
back of my hands. All the while she is examining me very closely with
those magnified eyeballs. Not just examining my arms and the back of my
hands, she is looking at every part of my face, and my neck. She is like 8 inches from my body!

She tells me those spots are quite normal, not to worry about them. Then she starts going through my hair. I feel like a kid in kindergarten getting checked for lice. She opens the back of the gown and starts examining my back. She touches here or there as she closely makes her way over my entire back. The whole time she is talking about how "husbands never notice things like strange moles on our back so we should learn to use a mirror to get to know what our backs look like..." She goes on talking as she works her way around my body, examining my neck and chest. She even reaches inside the front of my bra and examines between my breast, and underneath too! I felt so invaded, kind of like what I imagine it would be like if I were abducted by aliens to be studied.

Image by holohololand at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Finally she is done inspecting me from this 8" distance with those freaky looking magnifying glasses she is wearing. She says there is a mole on my back that she would like a biopsy of...today! I consented to the biopsy and she leaves the room while her assistant numbs up the area. The doc comes back in the room as abruptly as the first time and goes behind me and cuts off the mole in like 3 seconds and places it in a bottle to be sent in for biopsy. She quickly tells me she wants me to do monthly exams and see her in a year for the brown spots and she will contact me in 10-14 days with the results of the biopsy and we will go from there with that one. She is still wearing the headband magnifier, looking at me with those large cartoon eyes, yet talking seriously to me about her concern. Then she quickly exits the room. It was so surreal.

The assistant stops the bleeding, applies an ointment and a bandage and leaves the room for me to dress in my clothes again. She meets me at the door a moment later and escorts me to the from desk while going over my post-biopsy instructions.

So I went in for the brown spots on my hands and arms and leave with a biopsy pending for something on my back that I wasn't even aware of before. So I guess I will wait for those results...and hopefully if there is an issue with the biopsy results requiring me to return her, she will take off those darn magnifiers so I can see her real eyes.

That was the most bizarre medical experience I think I've ever had. I wish you could have seen her giant eyes probing every inch of me. I kind of wanted to laugh out loud because it was so strange, but it just didn't seem appropriate at the time. I've been snickering to myself about it all afternoon.

Saturday, August 23, 2014

Happy Birthday Whitney!

My baby just turned 30. I remember last year when she turned 29, she had such a hard time because she said she thought her life would be more on-track by then. Happily I can say that this year, her life is on-track. She is in a loving relationship, she is finally getting to be the stay at home mom she wanted to be. She has also discovered that she has an artistic side that she never had time, or the confidence to realize it. Look at the adorable chicken sculpture she made me.

She knows I love kooky things...and Chickens!

This sculpture of a pregnant woman was her first sculpture, isn't it beautiful?

I am so happy that she has found contentment in her life, and is now discovering who she really is, not just doing what she needed to do as a single mom to get by, working back to back double shifts on weekends, while the kids stayed with their dad or us, so that she didn't have to be away from her kids all week or put them in daycare. I am happy that she met a man who loves and adores her and the kids, bringing his own two children into the family has made my daughter even happier. He is the one who encouraged her to try sculpting. He asked her what she would like to do if she had the time and money to do what ever she wanted that would bring her peace. She said she always wanted to sculpt. He bought her some basic tools and a box of clay, and told her to enjoy. I have since bought her two more boxes of clay and she is slowly building her tool supply.

Friday, August 22, 2014

Last year I shared with you how to make your own fermented chicken feed, and I have continued to feed my 'girls' fermented feed, but it can be difficult, if not impossible, to keep the fermented feed from spoiling with our erratic work schedule. We are self-employed in the property rental business so we don't keep regular hours. If we have a tenant move out then we may have to spend several days away from home to prep the house or commercial building for a new tenant, or if something breaks we may have to make an unscheduled trip to that location to fix the problem. Which has resulted in my fermenting going bad a time or two because I was not home to tend to it. And Boy is that Stinky!

The only alternative is to feed them the full amount that is currently in the jar before we leave, which could be several days worth. It wont go to waste because they will just eat it and not their dry feed in these instances, but it just seems wasteful to me. When we are away (and aren't taking the chickens with us) we have a friend chicken-sit for us, but I cannot expect her to monitor my fermented feed for me...you develop a feel for how to maintain it, so it's just too much to ask someone unfamiliar with it to step in and do it.

Over time I have learned exactly how much feed it takes each day to feed my 17 hens (fermented feed is about half of their primary food, they also have dry feed available), so now I ferment my feed on a scaled down basis, meaning I only have on hand what will be needed for one day. This 'mini-scale' version works very well for us, and it would work for those of you who don't have a large flock and don't want to have a full-scale fermenting operation in your kitchen.

So instead of my previous set up where I used a huge 3-1/2 gallon jar on my counter (or the two bucket system I occasionally used outdoors during cool months) that I added more feed and water to each day after I scooped out their morning meal, now I just keep a 2 gallon jar by my kitchen sink.

Each morning I reserve most of the liquid from the fermented jar when dumping the contents of fermented feed into my draining tray.

Then I pour the fermented liquid back into the jar with what ever little bits that remained in the jar after pouring it out. I don't wash it out, because what ever is left in the jar, along with the reserved liquid, and this jump-starts the fermenting process for the new day.

Then I add the measured amount of dry feed needed for the next day. It's the same quantity of dry feed (4 cups) but it can be a varied mix depending on what the 'girls' needs are. For example, during molting season I add 1 cup of higher protein food like wheat berries or split peas, and during the cold months I will mix in some scratch corn to warm them up.

I then add about 5-6 cups of water. Once stirred and allowed to settle, there should be at least 2" of liquid above my dry mix. This allows space for swelling while still remaining covered by liquid.

I usually give it a gentle stir again in the evening, and add a little water if needed at that time to maintain at least an inch of water above the feed level. And that's it. So if I have to be away the next day I just don't mix a new batch for the next day. When I return home I will start a new batch. It takes a couple of days for the the true fermenting process to begin again from fresh, but the girls enjoy the wet feed during that time. Once the fermenting process is going, it stays good by just adding the liquid retained from the batch I am serving, plus the little bits left in the jar when I pour it out each morning. Since I am reusing the liquid, my mini-scale version is really no different then when you are fermenting in a big jar and keep adding more feed and water to jar each day to keep it going.

I can also bring my small jar with, and use this mini-scale version when we are traveling with our chickens, so they get fermented feed even when they are away from home. If you have just a few chickens, don't feel that you need to have a huge operation to provide your chickens with the benefits of fermented feed, try making your own mini-scale version of fermented feed.

Wednesday, August 20, 2014

We live in the high desert Arizona so it's not uncommon to find snakes, scorpions, and spiders in our house. Last night, just as we were getting ready to go to bed, my husband calls out to me from the bedroom saying that we had baby tarantula in our room, and could I catch him and take him outside. Yes, he expects me to catch him...I'm the official critter catcher at our house. I grabbed a glass from the kitchen and scooped up the little tarantula. He didn't seem too afraid of me, thankfully tarantulas move much slower than other spiders. This was the second baby I found in our room in a week.

Baby Tarantula found in our bedroom.

Once safely in the glass, but before I secured a lid on top (with air holes of course), I took a picture and sent it to my friend Helen, knowing she would appreciate my find. She suggested that we take it to Chuck at the SpiderPharm here in our community. Chuck milks spiders and scorpions of their venom, which is used in scientific studies and made into anti-venom. I hadn't met Chuck yet and wanted to see his spider and scorpion venom milking operation that Helen had been telling me about. She made the call and set up a time for the next afternoon.

Chuck and his wife Anita are the nicest people. Chuck took a break from his very busy schedule of milking spiders to give us a mini tour of their place, that started with a demonstration of him milking a Daddy Long-Leg of its venom. Speaking of Daddy Long-Legs, have you heard that they have more toxic venom then a black widow, but can't bite as deep, therefore they cannot penetrate human skin? Well Chuck was called in to the MythBusters show (13th episode) and they busted that myth. Here is a video clip where you can see Chuck milking the spider.

Nitrous Oxide Gas = Sleepy Spiders.

Watching Chuck milk a spider in person was so awesome. In preparation for the milking he turns on nitrous oxide gas that goes up to some jars partially filled with a clear liquid, the gas bubbles through the liquid and then passes through small tubes to the individual cups on a tray where each cup contains one spider. Chuck regulates which spider get the gas using several valves, this way he can put individual spiders to sleep as needed.

While asleep he takes them out of the cup (using his bare hands!) and grips them gently with a set of tweezers hooked to a tiny electrode. Then he holds them under a microscope so he can see them up close. He can see them so well that he can even tell if their little mouths are dirty. If they are, he cleans them with a rinsing solution, then sucks the water off. Then he places a mico-tiny syringe up to their face and just as he pushes a foot pedal to give them a little shock, he extracts the venom they expel. Amazing!

Chuck said it takes about 500 black-widow milkings to get enough venom to equal a single drop! 500!!! That must take a very long time even as quick as he does it. It takes a lot of spiders on hand to get that much venom...which he has. He took us to the rooms where he keeps all these spiders, there were easily thousands of them. Two rooms filled floor to ceiling with racks holding tray after tray lined with small cups, each containing a single spider. He also had some larger dishes housing tarantulas, and several tubs of scorpions too. It was very tight quarters in those two rooms. Can you imagine what would happen if a burglar unwittingly broke into that place and stumbled into the racks? OMG, that would be punishment enough I think.

While we visited, Chuck showed me what a Brown Recluse spider looks like. Their bite causes your flesh to die, its really nasty stuff. I have seen spiders around my home and suspected they were Brown Recluse, but now that I saw one in person, I know they were some other kind of spiders. Next time I will catch one and let Chuck tell me what it actually is. He also showed me two common types of scorpions in this area, one is more toxic then the other, but both will give you a painful sting. We have lots of scorpions around here. I find many of them dead in the house, thanks to my cats, but on occasion I will find a live one. Now I know what to look for to tell if its the really toxic ones, or the not so toxic ones (not that either one is good).

Brown Recluse Spider at the SpiderPharm.

As we were about to leave, Helen told Chuck and Anita that I am the 'Chicken Lady'...apparently I have a reputation in my town, ha ha. Anita said, "Oh, then I have something for your chickens they will love...fly pupae!" They took us around back to another building where they cultivate fly and gnat larve that they feed to the spiders and scorpions, about every two days. I cannot imaging feeding those thousands of spiders in individual little homes every other day! That must take hours. Anita handed me a shoebox tray of pupae (the stage just before becoming flying flies) letting me know they were only fed organic food (just like my chickens). I promised her I would bring the tray back soon, along with some fresh eggs as a thank you.

Fly Pupae (and some larve)

Once home I poured the fly pupae into the 'girls' dish and within 5 minutes they had devoured every last one. Thank you my friend Helen for this very interesting afternoon! Helen is always inviting me to do and see interesting things - look for an upcoming post about our trip to a nudest bookstore.